We have just moved to a new house and we're still discovering all the novelties. Heaps of boxes still "decorate" every room and we still have stuff at the old place, but we're slowly moving towards a more cozy feeling in here. Above you can see the view from our house this evening as the sun was setting.

We've been watching quite a few things on Netflix lately and last week we decided to check out Stranger Than Fiction with, among others, Will Ferrell, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman, and Maggie Gyllenhaal. I'm usually not a fan of Ferrell, but I really liked this movie. It has some really good acting, a surprising and intelligent script, and some very good storytelling. It's absolutely a movie I wouldn't mind watching again.

It's not always easy to be a mother and sometimes the conflicts are more draining than I would want. Our oldest is going through a phase in which he seems to be trying to find his way into adulthood. He expresses his wish to be viewed as an adult while at the same time having feelings of abandonment, which might be what occasionally causes him to act out. Frankly, at times he is outright rude towards us, doesn't want to help out with anything at home, and sees it as self-evident that we should do his bidding, be it on matters of food or on driving him to various things. If we don't do things "correctly" we'll be certain to hear about it. In many ways he is probably a typical teenager.

On Thursday evening, after a day when T. had driven to pick him up, dropped him off as well as gone shopping for him, T. asked him to fill up the water bottle he had just half emptied and then put it back in the fridge. Our son then flipped and screamed that someone else should do that "if it was so important," not him. T. pointed out that he was being selfish and that all of us should aim to make things easier for each other, not the opposite. I made clear to him that I agreed with T. on this.

Since then he has stayed in his room, barely coming out to eat (apart from leaving for school on Friday). He hasn't talked to us or his brother at all since then and has even removed the door handle on the outside of his door, thus underlining his current wish for privacy.

He is 18 years old. It's not as if he needs us for survival anymore, but what is happening right now is quite draining. I just wish he finds a way to interact without being rude, that he learns something valuable and that he doesn't do anything really stupid in the process, that he finds his way to the other side of this rough patch, and that he ultimately understands that we love him (but does not necessarily like his behaviour in the above cases).

The necklace in the image above is called Mother and was made by Edblad & Co.